It may not be unimportant to know that syphilitic eruptions are contagious by inoculation, and that secondary symptoms may be transmitted from one individual to another. When I was a pupil of the London hospital, a woman and her child presented themselves for treatment. The mother was completely covered with copper-colored scaly eruptions, obviously and unequivocally syphilitic. The child also had venereal sore throat, and ulceration of the mouth. The account which the mother gave of herself was, that the eruption appeared a few weeks after her confinement; and, upon further inquiry, it was discovered that the husband had had a chancre of the penis: that was cured, but secondary symptoms showed themselves upon him. It was during the presence of the latter that he had intercourse with his wife, at about the sixth month of her pregnancy. The surgeon of the week gave it as his opinion, that the disease was conveyed by the male semen being absorbed by the mother, which was sufficient to occasion the disease. The mother, husband, and child, all submitted to mercurial treatment and fumigations, and in a few weeks entirely recovered. _Treatment of Secondary Symptoms._—Now in the treatment of these cases, all of which are more than _skin deep_, it is evident that, unless the cause which produces them be expelled, all local repellants only exhaust the physical energies of the patient; for the cure by such means but provokes a speedier reproduction of the disease, and hence the necessity of constitutional as well as topical remedies. I have fully explained my views regarding the employment of mercury; and every day’s experience convinces me that, where the constitution is imbued with the venereal virus, there is no alternative but to employ the most active alteratives, to effect a decisive and speedy change in the state of the patient’s health. Various habits require various preparations; the blue pill, the oxymuriate, calomel, and the external application of the unguentum hydrargyri fortius, are highly useful. I have, however, of late, been in the habit of employing the proto-ioduret of mercury, with unqualified success; nor do I limit its administration to internal exhibition; it may be used externally. The advantage of this preparation over others is, that it rarely, if ever, produces ptyalism.